Summary The attack took place on Friday in the border area of Karm el-Qawadees in the Sinai Peninsula.
CAIRO (AFP) - A car bomb in Egypt s Sinai Peninsula killed 25 soldiers Friday, in one of the deadliest attacks against security forces since the military deposed Islamist president Mohamed Morsi last year.
Security officials said 26 other soldiers were wounded in the attack near El-Arish, the main town in north Sinai.
Jihadists in the peninsula have killed scores of policemen and soldiers since Morsi s overthrow to avenge a bloody police crackdown on his supporters.
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, the army chief who toppled Morsi and later won elections, has pledged to eradicate the militants.
After Friday s attack, Sisi summoned a meeting of the national defence council -- the country s highest security body -- to discuss the killings, his office said.
Security officials said the car bomb attack targeted an army checkpoint in the Sinai and was carried out by suspected jihadists.
"Most of the wounded have been seriously injured and not all of them have been taken to hospital yet," health ministry official Tareq Khater told AFP.
It is the latest in a string of bloody attacks against security forces in Egypt.
In August 2013, just weeks after the army ousted Morsi, 25 soldiers were killed in the Sinai when gunmen opened fire at two buses transporting troops with automatic rifles and rocket launchers.
In July this year, 22 border guards were killed in the western desert near the border with Libya.
Last month militants killed 17 policemen in two bombings in Sinai and later released footage of the attacks.
Those bombings were claimed by Ansar Beit al-Maqdis, the most active militant group in Egypt. It tried to assassinate the interior minister in Cairo last year with a car bomb.
The group has expressed support for Islamic State (IS) group jihadists in Iraq and Syria, although it has not formally pledged its allegiance.
The military has said it killed at least 22 militants in October, including an Ansar Beit al-Maqdis commander.
The group itself has acknowledged the arrest or deaths of militants, but the army has been unable so far to crush them despite a massive operation in which it has deployed attack helicopters and tanks.
The latest bombing came after an Egyptian military court sentenced to death seven members of Ansar Beit al-Maqdis Tuesday for carrying out deadly attacks on the army.
